Tagged Questions

Plato (424/423 BC – 348/347 BC) was a Classical Greek philosopher, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world. Plato is considered to be the founder of Western philosophy.

Hegel famously speaks of the idea in the third section of his Doctrine of the Notion, this playing a central role in his system. It seems natural to suppose a close relation to what is traditionally ...

In the late Platonic dialogue Parmenides, which places the youthful Socrates against one of the elder statesmen of Greek Philosophy - Parmenides; Parmenides says that the way to Philosophy is by the ...

Poorly versed in philosophical ideas, but I'm trying to get a grasp on some concepts discussed in The Last Superstition (2010), a polemical book on religion/theism by Edward Feser that an acquaintance ...

When calling themselves "Platonists" mathematicians usually mean that they feel they discover ideal facts that eternally exist in some way. My question is if this sentiment is consistent with Plato's ...

I was reading Republic, and when Plato finally "finds" justice in the city, he defines it as a kind of "doing one's own work", which to me implies also the necessity of finding a certain satisfaction ...

That time is unreal has been an observation of objective physics since Newtons time, and more paramountly since Einstein; and its most outspoken partisan, now, is Julian Barbour. Its also been argued ...

Can someone explain to me a layman explanation of the importance of the "cave sections" in Plato's republic and some questions that ponder modern philosophers or things I should ponder about the myth ...

If we assume existence of a non-material world of ideas that mathematics describes there are some questions that a Platonist has to address.
1) How is the ideal world related to the real one, where ...

I read up on the theory of forms and I understand it like this, when I see a car I am seeing the particular of the true form a of a cat. All of the cats I see are just imperfections of the true form. ...

First of all i would like to state my understanding of 'Plato's theory of forms' (very short version; excuse my poor english):
The platonic ideas are much more than mere representations in the human ...

Its well known that Plato was from the aritocratic elite of Athenian society. In his writings Socrates figure as his pre-eminent philosophical spokesperson.
There is a adage, which might be a truism ...

Should a king be restrict to marry a queen that is also a philosopher in Plato's point of view?
I know that the king had big power and should be a philosopher in Plato's view. If the queen have some ...

Nietzsche recalls the story that Socrates says that 'he has been a long time sick', meaning that life itself is a sickness; Nietszche accuses him of being a sick man, a man against the instincts of ...

I am currently reading Korsgaard's Self-Constitution in the Ethics of Plato and Kant (which you can find here). I was wondering if the argumentative step from an injustice in the perfectly arranged ...

Marcus Aurelius, well-known for his Meditations, in the second century AD, was a Stoic philosopher and also emperor of the Roman empire.
Plato, in his Republic, advised that the ideal rulers of his ...

In Phaedo to argue the soul exists after death with the cyclical argument, Plato posited a philosophical assumption that all opposites —e.g. less, greater; weaker, stronger; sleeping, waking; life, ...

In Plato's Sophist he tackles the question of being and not-being. Can something that "is" be "not" or to put it in perspective can an idea that is true be false?
If somebody has the idea of winning ...

I'm interested particularly in Socrates' condemnation of written words and its propensity to create a false and superficial sense of intelligence which seems so prescient in light of how people use ...

If my understanding is correct, Plato's theory of forms was developed to counter the relativism of Sophists such as Protagoras. His theory does not seem to have modern followers, as far as I know, yet ...

In greek philosophy, Plato especially, what is the difference between "gnosis" and "episteme" ?
Both apparently designate different types of knowledge, but I couldn't find any precise description of ...

From what I understand about Platos theory of Forms, it seems little to do with mathematical concepts, although he uses geometry as an example, for example the form of the Triangle, he also introduces ...

'Who guards the guardians' is a phrase lifted from the satirical poet Juvenal Satires, (and not as I thought from Plato). The context here is marital infidelity, but Juvenal being a (satirical) poet ...

I assume there actually was an Academy set up by Plato and not taken over by him and made famous.
In the paintings I've seen of it - admittedly done in the Renaissance -, it looks rather grand, like ...

This isn't a philosophical question per se; but asking for some clarifying background information on a classic book of philosophy.
In Platos dialogue Apologia Socrates mentions that Anaxagoras books ...

Although admitting that there was a long-running debate on the origins of Philosophy, Diogenes Laertius asserts that Philosophy began with the Greeks. This can mean only that the debate centred around ...